Canvaswork completed at last!

I've finally finished my big canvaswork flower picture. I have to say it's the sort of thing I usually hate but I'm pleased with the way this has turned out. I managed to find all nice pieces of wool, tape, and cord and I think the colours are quite jolly and the stitches somehow manage to convey the feeling of a jungly background. A relief to have completed something I'm pleased with for once! It's also been quite an interesting project for my three-year-old niece who has loved sitting on my knee and doing the odd stitch - the canvas and wool are both so big (three holes to the inch, I think it was, and the fattest wool I could find) and I used a plastic needle so she could manage a few stitches with close supervision (the pink ones, of course). And with the spare bits of wool we made a couple of cord belts for teddy :-)

Suffolk Newt College Exhibition 2011 - a few photos

Isabel and I mentioned to some of you that we had had a look at some of the art and textiles work at the SNC exhibition in June/July this year. There wasn't honestly much to write home about but we were very taken with one young man who had made some extraordinary sculptures with just white plastic cutlery. His subjects ranged from crows and monkeys to tigers and a virtually full-size horse (which was not on display but we tracked down to a class-room where it was boxed up after being brought back from display at the Suffolk Show. My pictures are pretty poor (can you see what it is, yet.........?) but may give you an idea - they were really good!

There were a few other, perhaps more relevant things so here is a picture of some felted shapes - nice and colourful - plus some interesting framing (v. relevant today) of a student's textile prints.

The layout of this post is really badly designed - sorry! I'll need some lessons on arranging text and photos. But at least I know it still works and I can get in!

Taiwanese Inspiration

The pictures I posted last year from my trip to Taiwan kicked off a bit of a dragon thing for me. Then the V&A had a fantastic (although bijou) exhibition of Imperial Chinese Robes earlier this year, which I took the day off to see. Unfortunately I didn't get a the catalogue as it was of really disappointing quality - you just couldn't see any detail - but I did take my sketchbook down (yes! I am trying to ovecome the 'sketchbook' mental block!) and the resulting drawings are easily the best thing in it. The robes themselves were a delight and you almost couldn't tell they were embroidered - the embroidery had such wonderfully neat stitches and was so all-covering it looked woven.

Although attempting to match such work for anyone who hasn't had a lifetime of full-time practice is hopeless, it all inspired me to have a go at my own little dragon, based on a photo I took in Tainan. If I've learned anything from our class, it's not to do the obvious, so he's a mixture of goldwork, silk shading, and non-traditionally, crewel work. None of which I'm very skilled at, but I'm quite pleased with how he's turning out so far. As a couple of folk have asked, here he is in semi-completed state. Perhaps I should start a thread on 'partly finished work'?

As an aside, am I the only person who's slightly disappointed at the closure of the V&A textile galleries? I know ultimately they're opening again in newer, better, premises, but I rather liked the fusty wooden cases and the quiet, out-of-the-way atmosphere, and I don't know whether I see myself making a separate trip to separate premises when they open. Oh well, in the words of Bill Heslop: 'you can't stop progress'...

Look what we made between us!

Well, here it is - the baby's quilt; hope you can spot your square (or squares). I think it looks really cute and hope you all agree it will make a nice present. I do hope Isabel approves; I have just finished sewing the edging today and I'll bring it in to college tonight.

Christmas Projects

Here are the photos I took of the work we all did over Christmas. I think the decorations are just lovely, and I wish now I'd had a proper go at finishing mine off.

Also all our 'rug canvas' work. I can't believe how different everyone's work is considering we all had the same brief, and again they're all beautiful. Looking at each of them gives me different ideas of things I could try, which is one of the reasons why I love working all together like this, but there's never enough hours in the day to try everything out. Mine's a bit of a relief: ages since I did something I actually like. I've ordered a bigger bit of rug canvas over tinterweb and am now going to have a stab at doing the whole pic.

Esme